Need To Eat Before Morning Run?

Everyone is different.
I am ready to run after half a banana and an espresso while my husband needs to eat at least a banana and some toast and wait for about an hour before running.
Find out what works for you and stick to it.

Eating before a early morning run is just a personal choice. Some don't stomach well eating so early in the morning, if that's you just drink a glass of water, maybe some juice or coffee and you should be good to go.

I never eat before running in the morning, even if I'm doing 20 miles. I don't have any problems feeling weak or faint. I struggle with anything in my stomach.

If you're training for a marathon or longer, you might get some benefit from not eating before running (more efficient fat burning). If your training for something shorter, there's no benefit to not eating.

it depends on the intensity. for hard efforts and especially races, I can't eat a full breakfast and I have to wait two hours before running otherwise I will get stomach issues at about km7-8 in a 10k. for normal base or threshold runs I can and will eat a proper breakfast before running, so rice/pasta/bread/fruit, and a lot more than the other responses in this thread. i worry eating so little you will cannibalise your muscles at intense efforts when your body is working too hard to get by solely from burning fat.

what you ate the night before probably matters too. carbs in an evening meal will help fuel a morning run.

Experiment and find out what works best for you. Took me a year to perfect it.

I'm up every morning at 4am and down at 9pm. No caloric intake before 9am or after 6pm (intermittent fasting). I hit the pavement at 5:30am. If I'm doing a long run of 15 miles or longer I'll eat a bowl of oatmeal w/ bananas at 5am and hit the road at 7am. For Boston, on Jan 1st I start migrating that morning eat/run schedule down about 3 hrs (1 for a time zone change and 2 for Boston's start times).

If you need to eat before your early run, then eat. When I do my 10 milers at 5:30, I don't eat before. I have a glass of water, only. But that's just me. I'm used to it. If I needed a protein bar before the run, I'd eat one. No big deal.

Through HS and college, and up to about 23-24yo or so, I could go out for a run or workout in hmthe morning on an empty stomach with no problems.

At about 25 yo, I would get faint and feel weak if I didn't eat something light beforehand.

Since then, I have discovered what works perfectly for me -- a handful of peanuts washed down with some plain (no sugar) kefir. And I am good to go for any physical activity, as long as I have a decent meal afterwards.

I dont eat before any morning workouts, easy runs or long runs. Most people I run with dont do the same but I've been doing it for 10yrs.

The only time I would eat in the morning before a run is if it's a race or a HM+ oriented session

20 y/o females probably benefit from eating more in general. Hormones and energy levels fluctuate like crazy at that age so any stabilizer is likely beneficial.

To echo others, find what works and keep experimenting. In college I never took gels during LRs, but in retirement I have found a gel around the 10 mile of the weekly 15er helps me not feel like garbage later in the day.

I have a masters degree in physiology and coach a few athletes, and have had some of my athletes ask me similar questions. Overall, from my understanding of the general research consensus, well trained men can usually do easy effort "fasted" runs <2hrs with a fairly minimal influence on their physiology (hormones, ability to recover, etc). There isn't much of a benefit overall to using this as a training tool (if you're training hard, your body is already very good at metabolizing fat without even doing strategies such as fasting to improve it). Fwiw, I occasionally do morning runs fasted, but never force it (I'm a 24 yo male).

In terms of women, it's a somewhat different story. Women fasting on easy runs are at a higher risk of having negative consequences of being in a short term energy deficit, and developing symptoms of RED-S (at worse, things such as stress fractures and amenorrhea and the consequences associated with those). It also appears that fasting has a greater influence and risk on disrupting proper hormone balance in females. Also, even if you're getting enough calories throughout the day to be in a positive energy balance, there's been good research demonstrating that being in a negative energy balance for even a few hours a day could still be causing detrimental effects.

Since higher intensity exercise relies more heavily on carbohydrates, I would say there is no good argument for fasting before harder workouts.

Tl;dr: men can fast before easy runs, but women probably shouldn't. Nobody should fast before harder workouts.

Trent Stellingwerf, a very well respected Canadian researcher (and also a coach to some of the top Canadian runners) is the expert on this topic, if you want to dive into this a little bit more.

Whatever works.

No it's totally normal. If you're doing decent mileage there's nothing wrong fueling properly for them. You'll probably recover better too.

I like to have a bigger, heavy on the carbs meal for dinner if I'm planning a workout or over an hour run in the morning, then I have a light snack either before the workout or in the middle of the longer run to carry me through, then I definitely make sure to eat a good meal afterward.

For easy runs, I just have my morning coffee, haven't noticed a difference with fueling, or I'll eat a banana if I wake up particularly hungry. I don't set a hard and fast rule about eating before easy runs, it's easier to go by feel. I get up between 4:30-5am to run, but I am also a young woman (25). I have the complication of nursing a baby, so that's more calories out the window that I have to make sure I'm getting back in.

So echoing other people, experiment, but maybe you'll be like me where a better, bigger dinner makes a difference.

carrying a gel would be the least disruptive option to your routine.

Eat oatmeal mixed with protein powder before and after.

You've got a lot of good answers; at the end it is whatever works for you.

Personally, I have a hard time running faster than easy pace with anything on my stomach, so I would only eat before running if going out for an easy run. By trial and error I have found out that I need at least 3-4 hours after a very light breakfast not to feel like throwing up during a workout. On the other hand, I have done hundreds of races up to the half-marathon with no issues on an empty stomach. The tricky one is the marathon, where I need to eat otherwise will bonk badly, so I do it 4 hours before the race.
That's what works for me.

As the variety of answers given so far would indicate, the best answer is "find what works for you and do it". I could never stomach running within a few hours of eating. I always ran first thing in the morning before breakfast, and even up to 23 miles I was OK with no food. When training for my last marathon I did practice forcing myself to down a couple of gels during my longest training runs but I was never convinced that it helped.

For marathon training morning runs, 8 - 12 miles, and long run days of 15 - 20, I have a banana and cuppa joe then I'm out the door. I'll take some apple slices with me on runs ten miles and up. The longest runs, a gel or two also.

Side bar, in high school all the indoor dual meets were on Saturday mornings. Like an idiot, I'd have a bowl of cereal at 7am and I'd be lining up for the mile at 9am. Lots of belly aches! Never run on dairy!
And, coffee. Let's just say it clears things out prior to a morning run, enuff said (except I wish I'd know that in high school before those Saturday a.m. miles.)

Actually the effect of your early morning run will become better if you don't eat before it. Instead try a little energy drink( you can make your own mix) or a cup of coffee with little sugar/honey in it before or during the run to take away that faint feeling.Eat normal regularely during your day. You aren't any anamoly as you think. You just have to follow what this running guru tells you to do. Good luck!

- The Magic Wizard Coach J.S - 🧙‍♂️👍🧙‍♂️